Rwanda

Visited: June 2022

Duration of visit: 8 days

Capital city: Kigali

Population: 13 million (2022)

Estimated reading time: 13 minutes

• Climbing volcano Mount Bisoke at 3,711 meters above sea level through muddy surface and meeting gorilla family on the way.
• Friendly and surprisingly calm people of Rwanda. On every step I received honest, calmly expressed words: “Welcome to Rwanda!”
• Genocide memorials remind on one of the most horrible events in human history. Genocide of Hutus on Tutsis caused over 1 million deaths in just 100 days in 1994. Visiting monuments, massive graves and museums is a heartbreaking experience.
• Kigali – the vibrant capital city offers some interesting places to explore, delicious local and international cuisine, lively bars and nightlife scenery.
• Butare (Huye) – the old capital on the south, provides the best museum in the whole country – The Ethnographic Museum.

Rwanda, the last country I visited on this trip (beside DR Congo, Republic of the Congo and Burundi), is The Switzerland of Africa; stretched out around thousand hills, landlocked, one of the smallest and most densely populated countries in Africa.

For me the most outstanding description of Rwanda refers to the cleanest nation in Africa.

The functional system through the ban of plastic bags, group awareness of the whole population, the establishment of an effective system for garbage collection and mandatory cleaning of homes and backyards, has brought astonishing result.

Dignity has been a big sticking point for the president Paul Kagame. His government has banned secondhand clothes and instituted national cleaning days – for what he says is the benefit of his people’s dignity.

Crossing the border between Goma in DR Congo and Gisenye in Rwanda is like entering into a completely new word. After not seeing more than 3 tourists in 4 weeks of backpacking around Congos and Burundi, I was shocked when encountering with a group of Dutch cyclists, American tourists and other muzungos being transported in private vehicles around Gisenye within first 15 minutes in Rwanda.

French language was replaced by English, even though majority cannot really understand a lot. Driving on the backseat of a moto-taxi with a helmet on my head, while comfortably navigating perfectly paved roads without traffic, disorder nor congestion, was a positive change.

It is obvious that the general policy of Rwanda is to position itself as a tourist friendly, green-orientated country with good infrastructure, cordial people and exclusive activities for tourists at high prices.

Another main difference is the cleanliness of streets, parks, patios and beaches; I haven’t seen a single piece of paper, plastic or garbage in the whole country. The last, but not the least important contrast is people, who attended me in a polite way without exception. No screaming, loud discussion or aggressive offering of random products.

The only exception being at the bus terminal, where bus agents compete convincing passengers to board their buses and pull them in all directions.

Musanze, also called Ruhengeri, is a main town in the northern region, serving as a good base to explore the nearby Volcanoes National park. Since I already did gorilla trekking at much lower price in DR Congo, I only wanted to climb a volcano in Rwanda. It was the end of dry season, weather was improving and the main summer tourist season had not started yet. A perfect time to climb volcano Mount Bisoke.

The volcano straddles the border of Rwanda and DR Congo, but the summit is located in Rwanda. Mount Bisoke offers the most popular hike that takes you up through the steep southwestern flanks from where in ideal weather a view to other volcano peaks opens. The crater lake in the volcano itself is not far bellow the summit.

These were my activities on the day when I climbed volcano Mount Bisoke.

5:30am – Wake up.

5:45am – Breakfast.

6:15am – Half an hour moto-taxi ride to the Headquarters of Volcanoes National Park. I pay the fee of 75US$ for a hike and present a rapid test for Covid-19. After 1 month of isolated travelling in Congos and Burundi I meet a big group of international tourists, who are mostly paying huge amounts of money (1,500US$) for gorilla trekking. It is a real industry in Rwanda, while in DR Congo I was alone, paying less than one third of the price.

8:30 – The group to hike the volcano consists of: seven mature Dutch ladies, Jack from UK, a Colombian nomad girl and a young French couple. Dutch ladies give me a lift to the starting point in their bus.

9:00am – arriving to a starting point at 2,500 meters above sea level. It takes 3 to 5 hours to climb to the top at 3,711 meters above sea level, depending on physical conditions, altitude adaptations and how bad the mud is.

9:10am – Fully equipped soldiers, guides and porters are ready. The guide announces that the time limit to reach the summit is 1:00pm, when everyone has to turn around and descend from the mountain.

9:20am – We start walking.

The path is really muddy and I try to avoid the worst parts, saving energy, breathing slow and following my rhythm. A local porter adopted me under his supervision and shows me the way. Pretty soon I realize that I can walk much faster than most of the teammates, so I am leading the group. Some Dutch ladies start giving up and return to the valley.

12:15pm – I reach the top of volcano at 3,711m. Great weather permits observation of the crater lake and nearby volcanoes that rise above 4,000 meters high. 10 minutes later a French couple joins me, while a Colombian girl climbs to the summit only a few moments later. They can hardly walk, even though they are only in the late 20s.

We take photos, eat cold pizza and Martin (the French guy) says:

“Rok, take my camera, make a video, I will propose my girlfriend to get married!”

He is not joking and 30 seconds later he is asking for a hand his girlfriend Bertille at almost 4,000 meters above sea level. She says yes and everybody is happy, full of energy again before walking downhill.

12:50pm – we start descending, while Jack finally makes it to the top. Pale and exhausted, but overwhelmed to see gorillas on the way. Dutch ladies didn’t make it to the top, but some of them spotted gorillas.

3:45pm – I reach the bus after extremely slippery and dangerous descend. Dutch ladies with the bus are gone. My guide is pissed off, because his backpack was inside the bus. What now? No problem, there is a solution for everything in Africa. I find a moto-taxi, who drives me 40 kilometers back to my hotel. I am exhausted and hungry, but high on adrenaline.

What a day: my knees can still manage some pressure, gorillas on the way up and a dramatic expression of love on the top.

“Life is like a box of chocolates. You never know what you are going to get!”

Forest Gump was so right.

Rwanda is warmly known as the land of a thousand hills and mountains, because of its hilly and mountainous physical natural beauty covering the land. My next stop is the capital city Kigali, which is easily described as … hilly, sprawling across numerous hills, ridges and valleys.

I needed quite some time to orientate around numerous districts of the city, since the road connections between them is not necessarily straight forward.

Moto-taxis are parked at every corner and for a dollar they are available to ride pretty much everywhere, any time of the day or late at night.

The roads are good, drivers respectful and mostly obeying strict police orders. On one occasion I fell into a traffic jam, when most of the drivers were really desperate and the ride was quite intense, but otherwise I was feeling save on the backseat with a protection helmet on my head.

Kigali has a vibrant restaurants and nightlife scene, providing options for every pocket. It is economic, cultural and transport hub since it became the capital following independence from Belgian rule in 1962. I liked it a lot and also found some interesting places to visit:

Kamironko market is very well organized with stalls by sections: fruits, vegetables, clothes, traditional colorful fabrics and right next to it women with sewing machines ready to tail a dress. As muzungo I was friendly invited to buy products or just visit a specific stand. No hassle whatsoever.

Inema Art Center provides a space for 5 artists to explore their creative talent. Founded in 2012 by brothers and self-taught painters Emmanuel Nkuranga and Innocent Nkurunziza, Inema Arts Center spurs creativity for personal, social and economic growth. The exhibition of paintings, sculpture and small souvenir shops, together with smartly created, decorated and exposed building itself is an interesting exhibition of African arts.

Talking to one of the artists, I realized how famous they are internationally. The promotion pushed the prices up and most of the exhibited articles today sell in thousands of dollars.

I found Biryogo car free food street by accident, wandering around my St. Etienne guesthouse in a nearby Muslim quarter. It is a pedestrian street, freshly painted, with a vibrant atmosphere around teahouses, restaurants, bars and pastry shops, attracting exclusively local population.

It’s a low-profile area, where tourists are hardly seen, famous for the cheapest brochettes in town. Most of the visitors and business owners are Muslims, but happy to attend any customer.

Kigali Genocide Memorial – a place of remembrance and learning. Inaugurated in 2004, it is the main complex dedicated to the genocide that occurred in Rwanda between April and June 1994.

There are over 200 different monuments around Rwanda hat remind on this dark, sad and insane massacre of Tutsis, when approximately one million people were killed in 100 days.

Kigali Genocide Memorial is a permanent memorial to those who fell victim to the genocide and serves as a place where the bereaved could bury their family and friends. The remains of over 250,000 people are interred there. This memorial also serves to educate about how the Genocide against the Tutsi took shape and examines genocide in the 20^th century.

I walked through the museums and finished the visit at the tombs, where people still offer flowers to the victims of genocide. Visiting the memorial is a heartbreaking experience and nobody should forget atrocities that happened in the country.

It is impossible to imagine from today perspective, how genocide could happen, but after the visit it was clear that the bases for this event were set long time ago and it was just a question of time when the massacre would take place. What is still hard to understand is, why the international community pulled away and didn’t prevent or stop the massive killing.

Campaign Against Genocide Museum is located next to the Parliament of Rwanda. It is a monument to liberators, who were fighting to stop the massive extermination of Tutsis, but also a strong message of the leading party that has been in power since 1994, creating new Rwanda, that belongs to all Rwandese people, orientated toward the future, but always commemorating and reminding on dark past.

Hotel de Mille Collines is one of the larger hotels as well as one of the best ones, but definitely the most recognized one. It became famous after 1,268 people took refuge inside the building during the Rwandan genocide of 1994.

The story of the hotel and its manager at that time, Paul Rusesabagina, was later used as the basis of Terry George’s film Hotel Rwanda in 2004. I had a chance to use some luxury facilities, because some friends were staying there.

Belgian Peacekeepers Memorial Center is dedicated to 10 Belgian United Nations soldiers who were brutally killed the day after the genocide started. They were guarding then Prime Minister Agathe Uwilingiyimana who took power after the Rwandan president Juwenal Habyarimana was assassinated in a plane accident.

The deaths of the peacekeepers in 1994 led to the withdrawal of the 450 Belgian troops in Rwanda, and eventually troops from other nations in the UN mission, opening the way for the genocide of the Tutsi community to spread.

The rest is history.

Butare, also known as Huye, houses the National University of Rwanda and the Ethnographic Museum. A great place to get an insight into the cultural history of the country and life before the colonization through exhibition of clothing, instruments, food, rituals and more.

It was built with help of Belgian government, inaugurated in 1989. Apart from beautiful exhibition with explanations in French and English, I was impressed by clean and well-maintained surroundings. The whole country and all monuments or museums I visited are really spotlessly clean and very nicely arranged. Many employees constantly work with passion and devotion to create pleasant environment for visitors.

Rwanda is well known by a horror of 100 days in 1994 when the genocide against Tutsis was executed, without appropriate reaction of worldwide community and/or international peace organizations.

It is hard to believe that ethnic haters can grow to such an extreme that 1 million people can be murdered in the most barbaric way in only 100 days.

It is clear that the conflicts were ongoing for years before and reconciliation might be still not finished process even 28 years later, but Rwanda is a good example, how a strong and questionable democratic government can bring prosperity, development and progress to a completely destroyed country.

Easy to travel around, focused on high end tourist packages (gorilla trekking and safaris in national parks), with extremely friendly and calm people, who should (but most of the time don’t) speak English, Rwanda is an easy destination to travel around. However, there are still many places where I had a pristine contact with locals, trying to understand how they think, live and recover after a tragedy that is still part of their lives today.

I am finishing the last day of my Central African adventure in style. Missing the flight connection in Cairo and extending a home trip through Istanbul. Similar as on the way to Congo five weeks ago, when a flight to Kinshasa was cancelled.

The last five weeks in Rwanda, Burundi, DR Congo and Republic of the Congo have been amazing with so many highlights that it is impossible to present them in a written form.

People, animals, food, languages, nature, transportations, etc. Africa has something special. It is not easy, nor cheap; challenging and unpredictable, poor and corrupt, but rewarding and unique.